Hostage to fear

[Randy Carson]

ST-

I'm going to post a few thoughts on the Problem of Evil/Pain/Suffering, and we'll see where this goes.

Thought #1:

Would you agree that there is a big difference in intelligence between us and a bear?

Imagine a bear in a trap and a hunter who, out of sympathy, wants to free him. He tries to win the bear’s confidence, but he can’t do it, so he has to shoot the bear full of tranquilizers. The bear, however, thinks this is an attack and that the hunter is trying to kill him. He doesn’t realize this is being done out of compassion.

Then in order to get the bear out of the trap, the hunter has to push him farther into the trap in order to release the tension on the spring. If the bear were semiconscious at this point, he would be even more convinced that the hunter was his enemy who was out to cause him more suffering and pain. But the bear would be wrong. He reaches this incorrect conclusion because he is a bear and not a human being.

Now, can we be certain that this is not an analogy between us and God? Sometimes God sees our condition and has do the same to us in order to free us, but we can’t comprehend why He does this anymore than the bear can comprehend the motivations of the hunter. Just as the bear could have trusted the hunter, so we can trust God.

The Fine Tuning of Evidence

Scripture describes God as a hidden God. This means you have to make an effort of faith to find him, and there are clues you can follow. If that weren’t so, if there was something more or less than clues, we would not be free to make a choice about Him. If we had absolute proof instead of clues, then we could no more deny God than we could deny the sun. If we had no evidence at all, we could never get to faith. God gives us just enough evidence so that those who want Him can have while those that don’t want Him are not forced to do so. Those who want to follow the clues will.

I do not agree with your analogy here.  The hunter is not omnibenevolent, omnipresent, and omniscient, as god "is".  The hunter, not being the trapper who set the trap, was not the genesis of the bear's suffering.  If the hunter is god and the trapper is satan (or sin itself), then you're attributing parts of creation to entities outside of god.  If god created all things "visible and invisible", then we can assume that god created the mechanisms of evil knowing they would be used for evil.  We are talking about the god of scripture, who is anthropomorphically described as being a trapper, a tanner, a warrior, a judge, a visitor who can eat and drink with arms, legs, a mouth, vocal chords, etc., among many other things. (see citations)  Basically, a man, somewhere in existence who can intervene.  

He'll help white American Christians find their checkbooks but ignore the prayers of the family of those clergymen abducted by ISIS.  Not a good relationship, me thinks.  How do I know?  Because, if I were a literalist, I would say that god himself understood my "kind" as knowing the difference between good and evil (Gen 3:22).  Given this, if I know the actions of this god are evil, I am in the right (and it would be good of me) to declare this god's actions as evil.  Therefore, I authoritatively declare (again, granting literalism) this god of the Hebrews, Christians, and Islamists an evil entity not worthy of worship... or even admiration.

I'm sure that you make the declaration, but I do not agree that you are correct. On what basis are you able to make this judgment? Doesn't it come down to this:

If I were God, I would do things differently.
God would agree with me if he existed.
Things are not different.
Therefore, God does not exist.

But the reality is:

If you were God, you would do things differently.
Things are not different.
Therefore, you are not God.

And that's about all that we can say about that.

It is my nature that declares this god as evil, not my condition.  The same evidence that is pointed to for a fallen condition, is nothing more than evidence for the nature of our species, something measurable and testable.  As theologians we understand the difference between the condition of man as described in scripture and man's nature.  If we grant the myth of Christian theism, we accept that god created us to have this  "fallen" nature.  You have a long way to go to prove that knowing the difference between good and evil, as described by even your own book, makes us fallen, when it is an attribute of the very deity you worship ...according to the very same account.

God did not create us with this fallen nature or "to have" it. However, he gave us free will which necessitates the potential that we will do evil. You cannot really love if you cannot really hate. However, it was man who CHOSE to actualize the potential for evil. Not God.

I know the difference between good and evil... whether or not it is because your book is true in its literal account, is irrelevant.  I, acting as an independent agent and member of this species, declare that your god is the source of the very pain that I begged him to relieve us from for more than a decade.  Not only because your book says I have that ability, but because doing so is rational and beneficial to our species.

Right. Because in your short-term view (and 10 years is but the blink of an eye), God should take away our suffering and pain. But this is because you cannot see the long view that God sees. You are simply not in a position to know how the suffering we experience in this life prepares us for what lies ahead.

1. The Bible through my interpretation using the very same method of interpretation by 50,000 different denominations in North America alone, adding Catholicism, and all the psuedo Christian religions like Mormonism and Jehovah's Witnesses.

2. Ingersoll, R. G. (1879). Some mistakes of Moses. Washington, D.C: C.P. Farrell.

Sola scriptura and the absolute right to private judgment. These are the errors that led to the 50,000 denominations of which you speak. But this is not how Jesus established His true Church which is founded upon Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition and the Magisterium of the Church.

Oh, and you made no effort to interact with my fine tuning of evidence comments.